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For
Martins, the high street is only one aspect of modern banking. Trustee, Executor, investment and Foreign
Services are just as important in creating new markets and income for the
bank. Our Bank never rests on its laurels,
and is always looking for new ways to bring its services to as many people as
possible. On this page, we have
brought together an A to Z of our “specialist” branches and services – here
there are more than eighty examples of how Martins brings banking to the
workplace, the housing estate, hospitals, industrial sites – a surprising mix
of sites and ideas that are testament to Martins’ desire to be first with
innovation… |
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A is for Abattoir… |
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In
this wonderful 1930s utility building, the Liverpool Public Health Department
Meat Inspectors are busy, well – inspecting meat. We are not too sure of how cash rich the
industry is here at STANLEY
ABATTOIR, but it is
enough for us to operate a sub branch from 1925 until 1969. As
we shall see later in this feature about Martins specialist branches, we do
turn up in the most unlikely places, but perhaps they are only unlikely on
the face of it. Our ability to sniff
out money doesn’t usually let us down, and any number of meat inspectors and
abattoir employees, not to mention those who trade with the abattoir and
those other businesses on the site are all likely to have a need to obtain or
get rid of amounts of cash. These
are the days before instant payments, and even
cheques are not widely trusted by
the ordinary working man or woman.
Therefore, with cash in charge to such an extent, a bank is a very
useful asset to a workplace such as this. Stanley
is our one and only abattoir branch, and as such has become something of a
curiosity. We are especially pleased
that Martins actually had someone take a photo of it for posterity! |
Image
© Barclays 30/2770 |
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C is for Cattle Market (and Auction Mart, too)… |
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Cattle
Markets and Auction Marts throughout the land have all benefitted from their
own branch or Martins Bank. The blueprint for this tradition of banking must surely
be YORK CATTLE MARKET whose story is told in a long but fascinating article
from Martins Bank Magazine, that has been reproduced on our branch network
page for York Cattle Market. The full
list of these branches is shown below, with links to those that have their
own pages in our online archive… |
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KENDAL
AUCTION MART OPENING DAY 25/11/1960
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Clitheroe Auction
Mart |
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TAUNTON
CATTLE MARKET 1966
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Morpeth
Auction Mart |
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Otley Cattle Market |
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Salford Cattle Market |
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Salisbury Cattle Market |
WHARFEDALE
AUCTION MART 1960s
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Shrewsbury Cattle Mkt
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Wakefield Cattle
Market |
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Wrexham Cattle
Market |
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York Cattle Market |
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C is also for Community… |
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Martins
involvement in the community is pioneering and also a little curious. Having used mobile branches at agricultural
shows and other events since 1948, it took nearly a decade for them to realise
how useful these would be to encourage people on housing estates to use a
bank. (This is an idea that has most
recently been resurrected by some banks who were bitterly chastised for
closing too many rural branches and now hope to regain custom by turning up
on the village green once a week). |
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On
the ERNESETTLE Housing Estate, Plymouth, a “social experiment” is
under way, when Martins takes (in its
own words) “the opportunity to get closer to the working classes” by opening
a branch there. Ordinary wage earners
are encouraged to swap cash for a bank account, and learn how to budget using cheques
and bank giro credit slips.
With the full backing Plymouth Council, Martins is given a small shop
front at a cheap rent, and spends four years trying to attract “community
custom”. The branch closes in 1962, and we have no record of its perceived
successes or failures! |
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1968
- Fill your car boot with cash, drive across
Lindisfarne causeway (at low
tide of course) and call at the homes of the HOLY ISLANDERS to provide a banking service. No, not ancient legend or fairy tale – but
FACT! Our intrepid Berwick Upon Tweed
Manager really does go to extremes to be helpful in the days when car theft
and being coshed over the head are relatively rarer crimes that they
are today. Truly an example of
community banking! |
Image
© Bing Maps 2011 |
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Image courtesy SUE ADAIR
www.geograph.org.uk |
A
bank in a hospital might at first seem like a strange idea, but again, we
opened one when cash was still the currency of choice for hospital staff,
patients and visitors alike. At
Liverpool’s Broadgreen Hospital, our branch served up the money to spend at
the WRVS tea room, or to use in the public phone, cigarette and chewing gum
machines. This is actually one of
Martins’ more successful specialist branches, operating from 1963 until the
year 2000. We are aware of least one
other Barclays hospital branch, at King’s Lynn, but it was closed down
in the mid 1980s. It is sad to think
that branches like these, once staffed with friendly and sympathetic faces
are now gone altogether or replaced by cash machines… |
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…and Custom House… |
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No
images or information here, but a branch is opened by the Bank of Liverpool
in the 1890s at Liverpool Custom House.
This office is listed as 21 Park Lane, and disappears from the radar
in the 1920s. |
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D is for Drive-In Bank… |
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Leicester Drive-in
1959-1988 |
Epsom Drive-in 1966 to
1979 |
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E is for Exchange… |
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No
images have yet appeared, but we are still on the look out for information
and photos of our various “Exchange” branches. The oldest of these is opened
by the Bank of Liverpool sometime around the 1880s. Berwick upon tweed Corn Exchange Branch is
one of the branches of the North Eastern Banking company that we inherit in 1914, and the
Lancashire and Yorkshire Bank provides us with branches at Manchester
Exchange, and Manchester Corn Exchange, when it merges with the Bank of
Liverpool and Martins in 1928. |
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F is for Forces… |
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Image
www.radarpages.co.uk
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I is for Industry, such as I C I… |
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Industry
means lots and lots of workers with wages, and one of the earliest schemes to
have those workers access their money over the counter is the I C I wages
through the bank Scheme.
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Unusually
for 1959 our branch at the I C I Wilton Works in Middlesbrough
(above, left)has a bandit screen, even though it is reserved for the
exclusive use of I C I employees! The
somewhat staged image on the right shows the Chairman of Wilton Works Council
at our Redcar Branch, receiving his first “wages through the
bank”, and proving the convenience of being able to access money at a number
of outlets. One
year earlier, a similar banking arrangement is made for those working on the
vast industrial site at Aylesford Paper Mills near
Maidstone. they too have their own exclusive sub
branch, with access to wages when they want them. In 1965 we repeat the exercise at the
futuristic NORGAS site at Killingworth, Newcastle upon Tyne. |
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Meanwhile,
at Kew Bridge in deepest Middlesex, (before it moves to Surrey), Martins
opens a branch in the British Wool Marketing Board building. It seems there is no stopping our
insatiable appetite for the credit balances of the humble British worker, but
will it be enough to stave off suitors in the future? Well, no – we know that – but it’s a damn
good try all the same. Kew Bridge is
the last of our experiments with the working classes, but there will always
be other groups to target, as we shall later in this guide to our specialist
branches… |
Image
© Barclays Ref 33-301 |
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S is for School… |
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and for SHOWS, exhibitions and Trade Stands… |
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We
do love a good show, or exhibition.
Our mobile branches already attend just about every agricultural show
there ever was, but if you’re a travelling salesman, boy scout, or visitor to
any number of ideal home exhibitions, we’ll be there too, with our range of
imaginatively designed trade stands.
Our love affair with shows begins with a six month stint at the North East
Coast Exhibition of 1929. The
following list is in date order, and comprises mostly those shows exhibitions
and trade stands for which we have images on our TRADE STANDS
page. |
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NE
Coast Exhibition 1929
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·
1950 British Industries Fair Olympia |
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1952 British Industries Fair Olympia |
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1953 Ideal Home Exhibition |
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1957 Boy Scout Jubilee Jamboree Sefton Park |
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1957 Industry Advances Exhibition Liverpool |
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1958 United Commercial Travellers Assn Buxton |
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1959 The Dairy Show Olympia |
Earls
Court Radio Show 1962
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1960 Cambridge Show |
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1960 Shoe Trades Exhibition |
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1961 Ideal Home Exhibition |
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1961 The Radio Show Olympia |
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1962 Great Yorkshire Show permanent branch |
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1962 Ideal Home Exhibition |
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Leicester
Show Machinery Ex’n 1962
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1962 International Hardware Trades Fair |
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1962 Leicester Shoe Machinery/Component Exhibition |
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1962 The Dairy Show Olympia |
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1962 The Radio Show Earls Court |
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1963 Ideal Home Exhibition |
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1968 Teesside Boys and Girls' Exhibition |
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1969 International Boat Show Olympia |
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T is for Trading Estates… |
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Trading
estates are seen by Martins as a potential source of income, and we try our
luck at three different estates in England and Wales. The first one opens at Team Valley Estate, Gateshead in
1937, and ten years later we add
Wrexham Trading Estate. Gloucester
Hucclecote follows in 1965. We have no pictures of Wrexham,
which closes in 1957. |
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U
is for University… |
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The
ultimate cash cow for banks is the chance to have a branch on the campus of
one of our universities. Things have changed
in the twenty-first century, and now that most students have to borrow their
way through their education, the attraction to banks of local authority grant
payments is all but gone. Martins has
branches at or near ten universities, and you can visit them by clicking on
the individual branches in the list below… |
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§ 1967 Bradford |
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§ 1960 Bristol |
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§ 1965 Durham |
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BRADFORD |
BRISTOL |
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1968 Lancaster |
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1960 Leeds |
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1958 Liverpool |
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DURHAM |
LANCASTER |
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§ 1966 Newcastle
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§ 1964 Norwich |
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§ 1960 Sheffield
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§ 1965 York |
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LIVERPOOL |
SHEFFIELD |
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© gut informiert 2007 to date |
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